


Two Fish in a Barrel

by antistar_e (kaikamahine)



Category: Firefly, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-13
Updated: 2010-11-13
Packaged: 2017-10-31 01:52:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/338569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaikamahine/pseuds/antistar_e
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Next time we pick up passengers, can we <i>not</i> go for the creepy, crazy, genius psychic ones that've broken out of government compounds?" Wash wants to know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two Fish in a Barrel

**Author's Note:**

> Written for robin_2370_hood, who prompted me with "two apples and a banana."
> 
> You can read this here or [@ LJ](http://antistar-e.livejournal.com/531075.html?format=light).

-

 

 

"I just can't help but wondering, sir," goes Zoe in her mild way, bracing her arms on the railing next to him. "Just when we became a wayward home for Academy break-outs?"

"The 'verse just does like smiling at us, doesn't it, Zoe?" Mal answers with a bright kind of cheer that only comes from the prospect of gettin' paid and possibly gettin' shot at. Down below, still half in the daylight, Kaylee's keeping up her chatter, drawing her passengers further up into the belly of Serenity: _them,_ River had said, elegantly pointing them out against the hustle and bustle of Hermes Alley, a backbirth port on Persephone which has allusions of being Eavesdown Docks in a way that makes Eavesdown Docks seem almost up to health standards.

 _They don't look like much,_ Kaylee demurred, an unconscious way of asking River, _are you sure?_

But River'd just flashed a smile. _They're good. They came out of the Academy, two-by-two, doctor and patient, like me. Mal will like them._

 _Oh hey no,_ had been Mal's response to that, when everybody looked at him. _The kind of people I like make for horrible paying passengers. I'm lookin' for quiet fare, darling, not the kind like to get us killed._

 _Simon and I are going to hide now._ River looked infuriatingly smug, like she hadn't even heard him. _Go, Kaylee, they're passing by._

And so here they are, two men, one tall enough to make Kaylee crane her neck back to talk to him, and the other plain-looking and limping. Mal manages not to prop a hand on his gun for reassurance, keeps them folded loosely on the rail, and studies them. The tall one's dressed nice, a little dusty from travel and worn at the elbows, like he'd been Core-born and fallen from grace, but he carries himself like he ain't used to thinking of other people's spaces, making Kaylee lean back when he talks to her like he ain't even aware of how much he towers over a little girl like her. They're talking engines, Mal notes, which explains why Kaylee ain't backing down.

The other man's got a duffel slung over his shoulder and a cane in the other hand, favoring his left side exclusively. He's dressed in the same desert-dust robes as half the vendors and small-time artisans in Hermes Alley do, his face and hands tanned the same dark color as his robes. He stays a half-step behind his companion, making only fleeting eye contact with Kaylee, which has Mal thinkin' maybe he's a hired hand or a bodyguard, like the kind that tail after the unsavory men Inara's always bringing to her shuttle.

Reaching some kind of conclusion in the conversation, Kaylee flings her arms up in a victory pose and spins on her heel to call up to Mal, "Cap'n, they're gonna come with us! Get down here and meet 'em proper-like!"

"Work, work, work," Mal sighs, and at Zoe's rueful chuckle, descends down to the landing.

"Fellas, this is our good captain, Malcolm Reynolds," Kaylee goes, gesturing to him. "Mal, this here is Sherlock." Well-dressed with a ridiculous name, Mal thinks, definitely Core-bred. "And this is John Watson. He's a doctor," she beams.

Not a bodyguard, then. Mal keeps his surprise to himself and shakes hands with them both, congenial enough. "We can always use a good doctor out around these parts," he says. "So we're mighty glad to have you. You folks gonna be paying us for the pleasure of your company?"

The tall man, Sherlock, only offers a thin, private smile, like he's enjoying a joke, and John Watson swings the duffel bag around to get at one of the side pockets.

"We can pay you in coin," he goes; there's a rasp at the back of his throat, like he's inhaled smoke at some point, or been in the desert wind too long. He's got a pouch in one hand that he offers up to Mal; it clinks satisfyingly when it's snatched up. "But we also got this."

He removes a clear plastic bag next, and Kaylee yelps. "Fresh fruit, oh! Why didn't you say so in the first place!"

"It's not much," the doctor says, sounding confused as she lifts the fruit up to the light, inspecting them reverently. "Just two apples and a banana."

"Well, great," Mal says with a ribbing line of sarcasm. "Because the last time Kaylee accepted fruit as fare turned out so well for us."

"I resent that, captain," goes the Shepherd, coming up behind them, no real offense in his tone. "Although I _have_ been craving a good apple pie."

-

Once they're shown their quarters, John Watson changes into a shirt and trouser like they're all wearing, blending in just like that.

It turns out the new doctor can cook, too, and he gives Book a hand in the kitchen, moving back and forth in his hobbling way that's a little distracting to the crew because they're not used to it, but he doesn't seem all that awkward, not like Sherlock is -- neither of them rightly said what it is Sherlock _does_ besides pry into business he has no business prying into. He makes an enemy out of Jayne within five minutes of meeting him, and the hostility lasts until he says something that makes all the color drain out of Jayne's face in one fell swoop. He retreats into his bunk like he's got his tail between his legs, and Sherlock seems a little off-put when everybody stares at him with something bordering on awe. Mal's never seen Jayne back down from anyone who didn't at least possess a bigger gun.

It goes on like that until dinner, when Kaylee's happily passing around slices of real apple pie like the kind Mal ain't had since that tour they did in the mountains of Ariel just as the leaves were turning orange, and Sherlock fiddles with his fork and then abruptly blurts out, "So are the two fugitives going to join us, then?"

Silence doesn't so much fall at this so much as it lands on the table with an almighty splat. Kaylee's movements hiccup. The temperature in the mess hall drops an easy ten degrees, and out of the corner of his eye, Mal spots Zoe's hand going for her holster and Jayne casually removing his knife from its hilt to slice himself a bit of the so-far untouched protein bar.

"I don't think I know what you could be referring to," Mal goes after a beat.

Sherlock sighs, like they're being deliberately tedious. "Well, you're not being very careful about hiding them, are you," he goes, putting his elbows on the table and leaning forward earnestly. "It's obvious. There were nine chairs already set up at the table when the Shepherd gave us the tour, none of them dusty like they'd just been removed from storage when we arrived, which means there must be nine people regularly in your employ, because on a ship this size there's no point in having furniture out where you don't need it."

He holds up his fingers, ticking them off one by one. "The bridge, shuttles, engine room, and cargo bay are all off-limits to John and I, which is not unreasonable for a bunch of smugglers -- oh, don't get all tetchy, you fly a Firefly-class transport ship and furthermore, it's a model that's gone out of date the same time your brown coats did --" Kaylee makes a noise at that, and Sherlock's eyes flick to her, and he visibly pauses like he's reminding himself of something. "Though it's engine work has been remarkably well-maintained, well done, Ms. Frye, but you must admit, it's not that hard to figure out that you're pirates. You're on your way to Greenleaf, but you're in no hurry if you're taking on passengers with no stated destination, which means you aren't that excited to meet whoever's waiting on the other side. Rightly so, since the Earth-That-Was artifacts you have in the hidden compartment you completely fail to keep hidden are very fake, and your buyers know it and are setting up an ambush for you, which explains your reluctance to walk right over to them. I suggest you ambush them first."

He pauses to take a breath, staring at the light fixture above their head like it couldn't possibly concern him that he now has the undivided attention of everyone in the room. "Both the shuttles are occupied, yet you only mentioned that your Companion uses one, and the fact that you've made no attempt whatsoever to introduce us to the two remaining members of your crew mean that you don't want us to know about them, even though you picked us up at one of the most notorious criminal trading ports on Persephone. Smugglers with passengers they don't want us to know about -- fugitives. Very valuable fugitives. A doctor, I'd say, since what you mentioned about needing John's expertise is clearly a lie, since all the equipment in the medibay has recently been cleaned by someone who knew what they were doing. Yes, one of the fugitives is a doctor, and the other is his wife -- no," he corrects, now studying their reactions. "Not wife, closer, family, then. A sister. Yes, that's it, isn't it? You're harboring a doctor and his sister."

And then, the moment Mal's been dreading, the light suddenly goes on behind Sherlock's eyes, making them go as pale as glass. 

"Oh," he breathes. "The Tam siblings. You've got the Tam siblings. _You._ Oh, how very, very clever of you."

Silence again, the charged kind that happens right before everyone goes for their guns.

"If you value your continued existence," Zoe begins, slow and calm and cold as ice. "You will leave this table and walk out of this room until such a time as we can decide which airlock we're going to throw you out of."

Bizarrely, Sherlock looks to John first. "Bit not good?" he goes, sounding unconcerned.

"Bit not good," John agrees, going to him. When Sherlock sweeps out of the room, leaving his apple pie behind, John goes with him, even though no threat had been leveled against him personally.

After they're gone, Mal exchanges significant looks with Zoe, and Kaylee putters around uneasily up until Inara stands and goes over to hold her. Jayne scoots a couple places down so he can eat Sherlock's pie.

"Next time we pick up passengers, can we _not_ go for the creepy, crazy, genius psychic ones that've broken out of government compounds?" Wash announces, in his abrupt, too loud, and cheerful way. "Do you think that's something we can manage? Just a suggestion."

"You know what I think?" Jayne offers.

"Enlighten us," deadpans Mal, meaning, _no._

Jayne's oblivious. "We need to stop meeting people who are so damn smart. Never did anyone a lick of good, being smart. Just makes 'em enemies and gets 'em killed." He nods meaningfully, and eats a bite of pie off the serrated edge of his knife.

"I couldn't agree more," Mal grumbles, standing to clear his plate. He suddenly finds himself without an appetite.

-

River and Sherlock take to each other immediately. It must be some eerie Academy thing, because the moment she comes out of the second shuttle, she makes a beeline right for him, and they just stand there _gazing_ at each other in a way that makes everyone around them distinctly uncomfortable, even though they're not the ones getting looked at. From a distance, it probably looks comical; Sherlock clears River's height by a solid foot and a half, but the expression in their eyes isn't one that makes it easy to laugh.

"Aren't you a little old to be a student?" Simon asks, keeping close enough to his sister that she could be safe in his arms in a heartbeat if she needed it. Noticing that a few too many people hovering around, Mal makes a rude gesture with his chin; Wash, Kaylee, and Jayne all melt away, making faces. The tension in the air eases marginally.

Sherlock swings his wide, hungry gaze to fix on Simon. "Yes, quite, how cleverly deductive of you," he says in a voice that suggests it's anything but. "I was not a student of their special government-brainwashing curriculum, no. I worked in the morgue. They gave me bodies, and I would determine the cause of death."

"Bodies --" echoes Simon, before his face shutters in rage. "Those were _children_ and you just--" he hisses, true violence written in every line of him.

He steps forward, and John's there instantly, hand on his arm, same time Book's, "easy, son," comes from above, and Mal snaps, " _Doc."_

"Hear him out," says John carefully.

"The boy in the back doesn't read the books they assign, not like I can. You are no Oracle of the sun," River murmurs to Sherlock, who nods.

"She's right," he goes, like that made sense, and curls his lip. "It took me only days to figure out that the same set of someones with a lot of money at their disposal were torturing these children to death, and only wanted my expertise so they could figure out how to make their experiments _not_ as fatal in the future. So, I started recommending a 30cc dose of morthochryline on those patients they had no use for anymore --" Simon sucks in a breath, startled. "-- which put them in a state of sleep so deep that even an Academy-paid doctor would think them dead. Then I smuggled them out." Catching the looks that must be on their faces, he lifts his shoulder in a shrug. "There wasn't much I could do for the healthier students without attracting attention to myself, so, unfortunately, it was only those damaged practically beyond repair that I could return to the real world."

River scuffs at the floor, and Mal ducks his head a little bit to catch her eye, thinking at her, _you said these'd be folk I would like. So far I ain't seein' it, darling._

"You're not listening," River answers him, sticking her tongue out.

"If you don't mind me asking, young man," Book calls down from above. "How did you wind up wandering around Hermes Alley? You're a long way away from a morgue in the central planets."

"I got caught," Sherlock replies, smiling without humor. "By one of the professors."

"Moriarty," goes River in a low sing-song, and Sherlock and John's expressions both shutter instantly.

"Quite. Instead of turning me in to his superiors, he thought it'd be fun to play a little game with me. Though his idea of a game and mine didn't really match up." He reaches up to card his fingers through his hair, deliberately turning his head to show them the thick, ugly scars across his temples that his curls had covered up. "I never developed any paranormal abilities, though," he murmurs, eyeing River speculatively.

"Oh, so the creepy just comes natural, then," Mal mutters under his breath. "Good to know."

"Wait," and that's Inara, horror writ large in her eyes. "You escaped to the edges of space, but that man's still at the Academy, teaching young children?"

"I'd hardly call it teaching. The man's too psychotic to keep to a proper curriculum. Playing around in their brains, yes, he's still doing that," Sherlock shrugs again. "Probably would sell a minor internal organ to get his hands on me again, I do think I lifted his boredom some."

"And you go around calling _us_ fugitives," Simon grits out.

"This is the last thing we need, sir," Zoe breathes to Mal, low. "More enemies."

-

A couple careful days of deep-space travel go by, in which Sherlock successfully overturns every single stone there is to be overturned on a ship the size of Serenity.

"Has it ever occurred to you that there are some things I don't want blabbed to the entire crew?" Mal growls at him, ill-tempered like a dog. All he wanted was to eat a nice protein-dinner without all his war stories being dredged up.

"The battle of Odin Harbor, really?" the doctor speaks up from the other side of the mess hall, making Mal startle; most of the time, he forgets John Watson is even there. Dangerous, goes the minute narrowing of Zoe's eyes: the people who disappear so easily are the most dangerous. 

"I fought there, too," John continues with a self-depracating smile. "Or, rather, I volunteered. On the side of Unification, naturally," he shrugs, like there isn't even a question.

Mal's jaw tightens, and then he lets it go.

"Did you now?" He doesn't think there's any more of an edge to his voice than there normally is, but a sudden silence immediately falls around the table, noticeable and sharp. Zoe's watching from one end, and Sherlock and River are unnaturally still on the other, eyes big and fixed unblinking on him. Mal forces himself not to react to it, taking another bite of his dinner. "How did that work out for you?"

There's a pause from John's direction before he answers. "About as well as it did for you, I imagine," he goes, as mildly as if he's commenting on star patterns. He picks his cane up from where it's leaning against the cabinets and limps from the room with slow, deliberate steps, somehow doing so with more dignity than Mal has ever managed while retreating from an argument. Sherlock rises and follows, and for all that they're just two men, Mal gets the distinct feeling that disapproval is radiating from everyone who's staying behind. And _really?_

Well, hell on a yellow-bellied monkey anyway. This is going to go great.

-

Simon lasts longer than Mal gives him credit for, but the first chance he gets, he corners Doc the Second in the hallway and goes in his low, urgent way, "Dr. Watson, please, may I have a word?"

And Mal doesn't mean to eavesdrop, really, but frankly it's their fault if they've having this discussion in the hall right above the main bunks, so he can't help but giving his eyes a good roll when Doc the Second goes, "Dr. Tam, yes, of course, how can I help you?" because, really, they're on a pirate ship in deep space, who do they think they're going to impress?

"I need to know ... Sherlock, the things he went through -- how is he -- he's okay--"

"That's not really the word for it," John says dryly.

"He turned out _functional,_ though. He came out of it and he can still function, can still talk. What can I do -- what treatment -- how can I -- _River."_

John seems to get it, whatever the hell point Doc is trying to make, because when he says, "Oh, _Simon,"_ there's a wealth of understanding behind it. "Simon, the thing you have to understand is that they only had Sherlock for a month, maybe two, at most, before he escaped. But River ... they had River for _years,_ during some of her brain's most development stages. There's really no comparing them."

"So what you're saying is that there's basically no hope for my sister."

"That is _not_ what I'm saying. If there's anyone -- Jesus, Simon, you were the number-one trauma surgeon on Osiris. Your dissertation on the effects of morthochryline on schizophrenia is now practically a canonical gospel. I mean, not to get all bibbledy on you, but I still kind of want to shake your hand and then gossip to my friends about how I finally met you. What I'm trying to say is that if there's a medical cure for whatever is wrong with River, then there's no one better suited for finding it than you. But it might not be medical. It might be something River's got to work through on her own."

"I'm not leaving my sister to face this alone," there is steel in Simon's voice.

"I didn't mean that. I meant maybe it's something River can work around without heavy medication. She's seventeen, her brain's still growing and changing. She might pull through. And she knows she's got you, that's gotta be a big help."

"Just like Sherlock's got you?"

"Yes," says John instantly and on pure faith.

Really, though, it's getting to the point where Mal kind of wants to say something, except Jayne beats him do it, drawling over-loud, "Not that this ain't real touchin' and all, but can you take the namby-pamby elsewhere, some of us are tryin' to get some shut-eye."

"Naw, Jayne, don't be like that." Kaylee, this time, since her bunk is right next to Jayne's. "I thought it was real sweet."

"Yeah, like the fairy godmother of the crazies, I'm all over in fuzzies now."

John thumps his cane emphatically against someone's door, and Mal's doing his best to muffle his laughter as he shuts the hatch to his bunk.

-

They're three days out of Greenleaf when Wash wakes him up in the middle of the night, panic making his voice cracking and sharp, "Mal, you better get up here, and fast. We've been booby-trapped and there's an Alliance vessel bearing right down on us."

Groaning, Mal rolls to his feet and slaps his hand on the intercom without even looking. "Rise and shine, ladies and gentlemen, we got unfriendlies coming in, nice and Alliance-like. Doc, make you and your sister are hid away tight." He thinks about it a second, and adds, "and if you got room, best see if you can get Sherlock and Doc the Second squirreled away, too, I don't trust the Alliance come barging in stickin' its nose where it don't belong."

He doesn't even have his trousers on, but it doesn't matter; he scrambles up to the bridge in just his boxers and too-loose shirt.

Zoe's already there, and Wash spreads his hands helplessly. "They did something to us from afar, Mal, we're dead in the water."

Mal hits the intercom again. "Kaylee?"

"I don't know what it is," Kaylee's voice wails back, thin and hurt. "She just won't _go,_ Cap'n. What kind of tech they got that they can silence her without _touchin'_ her?"

"No kind I ever want to meet," Mal says, grim. He steps up to the controls, leaning forward to get a good look out the window. He lets out a low string of cuss words in Mandarin. "That ain't no friendly patrol vessel."

It's a full battlecruiser, built like the finger of God, looming up from behind them, frighteningly large even at the distance it still maintains. It's even got its own halo of smaller ships zipping around it like flies. Cold fear settles heavy in Mal's belly.

"It's too early in the morning to die," he says.

The comms crackle to life. "Malcolm Reynolds, I presume," comes a pleasant voice, loud and as clear as if it was coming from the ship itself. "What a pleasure it is to meet you at last."

"Yeah, well, I think I can safely say that the pleasure is yours alone," Mal responds easily. Serenity doesn't have the clearest visual comms link in the first place, and the man that's showing up on the screen is tinged unpleasantly green; he's purse-mouthed and his nose is too small in proportion to the rest of his face. In short, he looks utterly plain and not at all like the kind of person who'd freeze an independently-owned ship in the middle of deep space just for a friendly chat. "Mind telling me what all this hullabaloo is about? Last I checked, Alliance don't do this kind of door-to-door sales schtick."

"Hmm, yes, you do have quite the typical Browncoat ability to mouth off, I must admit I'm not all that surprised to see it. But you're right, this is not much of a pleasant chit-chat, I'm afraid."

"Mal," cuts in Jayne's voice over the intercom from the cargo bay. "They've docked us and breached us. We got two dozen ruttin' Alliance soldiers sittin' pretty down here, right on our gorram ship." A rustle of someone saying something in the background, and Jayne amends, "and they've got very big guns."

Mal cuts his eyes back to the face on the screen.

"I do apologize," the man says in a facsimile of sincerity. "But I really must insist on speaking to Sherlock, if you would be so kind as to fetch him for me."

"Who says he's here?" Mal fires back, more kneejerk than any real desire to cover it up. His mind whirls, flitting back to the story Sherlock told of the Alliance professor who played around in his brain like a chess game.

"Please, Mr. Reynolds, let's not act like children. I know he's there, just like I know all seven of your crew members, from dear Hoburn there to little -- Kaylee, is it? In fact, I had tea with a Mrs. Anita Cobb just the other day, very nice lady. Wanted me to pass along her regards to her son. I'd be much obliged if you do that, too."

"Who _are_ you?" Mal snarls, all his hackles raised.

"Oh, don't be alarmed on my account. I have no desire for any harm to come to you or your crew. It's hardly worth my time to imprison and transport a bunch of bottom-feeder pirates, now is it? I promise I won't even remove dear Sherlock from your ship; I don't want him to go back to the Academy any more than you. I just wish to speak to him." Another beat of silence, and the man continues patiently, "I'd really rather not resort to blackmail, Mr. Reynolds, it's so tacky."

Mal cuts his eyes to Zoe. She lifts her eyebrows questioningly, and he jerks his head in nod. She leaves without a word.

"Excellent," goes the man on the screen, who couldn't possibly have seen Zoe go. "Do hail me back when he comes up, will you?"

The screen goes blank.

Mal lets out a shaky breath, but before he can say anything, there's a low, back of the throat noise from behind him, like an animal backed into a corner and terrified. He twists around to find Book standing at the top of the stairs, his hair braided loose and his face pale. Inara's with him.

"I know that man," he says after a moment, which he spends obviously trying to regain his composure. He gives Mal a very pointed look. "His name's Mycroft Holmes."

Inara speaks up. "Mal. What -- what has Sherlock done to deserve the full wrath of Mycroft Holmes to come down on us in person?"

"I guess we'll find out," Mal answers flatly. "What do you know about him?"

Book closes his eyes, lips moving soundlessly in prayer. "He _is_ the Alliance, Mal. There isn't a single thing the government does that Mycroft doesn't have his finger in somehow. There isn't a single thing he _couldn't_ do to us, if he wanted to."

"Well, now, ain't that nice and cheerful. Exactly who I always wanted to meet."

Footsteps at the bottom of the stairs; Book sidesteps out of the way as Sherlock comes bounding up on bridge, taking the steps two at a time. John follows behind him at a much more labored pace, and Zoe brings up the rear.

"Well?" Sherlock demands, taking in their grave expressions. "Who is it who's so keen to speak to me that you'll drag me out of my albeit incredibly uncomfortable hiding place?"

"Man by the name of Mycroft Holmes," Book says, and John's head jerks up in a telling way, but Sherlock's expression doesn't change at all. He stares out at the shadow of the ship that's completely swallowed them.

Wash shifts uncomfortably. "Should we call him back, then?" he goes, voice wavering a little bit, like he knows just how absurd the question is.

Mal nods at him.

Mycroft answers almost immediately. "And there he is, just the man I wanted to see! I knew I'd find you eventually, but surveillance on these outer planets just isn't up to the standard I'd like it to be."

"How dreadful for you," goes Sherlock, droll. "What do you want, Mycroft?"

"To apologize, of course. If I had any idea what Mummy had done, I would have put a stop to it in a heartbeat. Dear old lady, she's going a bit bibbledy these days, I must admit, but I know for a fact she wouldn't have wanted her youngest son in the hands of Moriarty no matter how many official forms he got her to sign."

Mal catches Zoe's, Inara's, and Book's eyes all in turn, wanting to know if they heard the same thing he did: Sherlock's talking to his _brother._ They look back at him, wide-eyed and startled.

"Naturally I broke you out as soon as I was able," Mycroft continues, voice as pleasant as if they aren't talking about torture. "I just wanted you to know how truly sorry I am you had to go through that. Mummy's had a stern talking to about signing things without reading it."

"If you really cared, you'd make it so that there's no conceivable way that man can ever get his hands on another person, must less young, impressionable children," Sherlock snaps, a true note of impatience coming into his voice.

"Oh, now, dear, we both know that's not strictly true. Wouldn't you rather have him here, under Alliance payroll and playing under Alliance surveillance, than out there amongst the planets, doing whatever he pleases?"

"I'd rather he'd be in a pine box six feet under," Sherlock is nothing but cold now. "It's not just me or the children, Mycroft, and you damn well know it. What about John --"

"Ah, yes, John!" Mycroft lights up. "I'd almost forgotten about him. How is our dear old doctor doing?"

"Fine, thank you," John calls from where he's lingering in the background with Mal's crew. "Which you know perfectly well."

"Of course I do," the man on the screen shrugs modestly. "But it's so nice to hear it in person, wouldn't you agree?"

" _Mycroft."_

"Yes, yes, no need to get tetchy, dear. I do think I've taken up enough of your time as it is. I just wanted to catch up with you, and meet the ... ah, _illustrious_ company you've been keeping these days. My superiors do like to insist that we bring you back to the Academy, but I think you're much betters suited out here, don't you agree? There are some people we'd like you to keep an eye out for, if you recall. We'd really like to have them back, and you're more than capable of tracking them down. Give my best to John, and tell Mr. Reynolds we'll be out of his hair before he knows it. Good seeing you again, Sherlock."

The comms crackle into white noise again. There's no way for sound to travel in space, but Mal swears he can hear the whine of the giant Alliance vessel's engines as they power up.

Sherlock's lip curls in disgust. "He was never happy unless he had the last word." His eyes slide sideways to Mal. "My brother means what he says. He won't pursue or prosecute you. In fact," the lip, if possible, curls further. "He'll probably try to reimburse your next few ventures personally, so long as you agree to get rid of me as soon as possible. He doesn't like wild cards."

"Does this mean we know someone who's more respectable than Inara?" Wash speaks up, voice low with awe. "I never thought I'd see the day."

"Thank you, Wash," Inara goes, dry as bone.

"Anytime. So, hey, now that we've had an assignation with the forces of the government, do you think it's time for breakfast?"

-

Mal leaves them to their just-escaped-certain-death banality and goes down to the cargo bay, where, true to Mycroft's word, the occupying Alliance forces are making their retreat from one ship to the other.

"Oi, you!" shouts one of the officers, gesturing up at him. "Get down here, I got a message for you."

"Jayne, clear out," Mal mutters out the side of his mouth as he passes him. "I can handle this."

"You sure, Mal?" Jayne hisses back. "Ruttin' ship that big, I'm sure they won't notice just one piddly little officer missing."

"That's sergeant to you, thank you!" the officer shouts up. Apparently, uncanny hearing is one of the things the Alliance is looking for in their recruits these days.

"Jayne," Mal says pointedly, and he grumbles, but obediently disappears back up the hatch. Mal turns on his heel and heads down the stairs.

Up close, the sergeant reminds him a lot of how Zoe was, ten years younger and fresh-faced, even if Zoe wouldn't have been caught dead wearing Alliance threads unless it was part of some undercover thing, and Zoe never had a fondness for guns so big she couldn't hid them under her vest if necessary. "DONOVAN" is stitched across the breast pocket.

"Can I help you?" Mal inquires, using a tone that more clearly says, _can I airlock you and get away with it?_

The soldier cocks her head. "If you want my advice, you should stay away from Sherlock Holmes."

"Why thank you, Sergeant Donovan, that had never occurred to me before. Good thing you're here to steer me down the correct path." He flashes her a shit-eating smile, just to see her mouth thin. "Out of curiosity, why should I?"

"Because he's a psychopath," she answers. "And I know you've seen it, Reynolds, the men who've come out of war shell-shocked, and the men who've seen Reavers and lived to tell the tale. It's part of how they cope: they become what it is they most fear. One day, Sherlock Holmes won't be the one dissecting the dead bodies to see how their brains have been played with. He'll be the ones putting them there."

There's something about the stone-cold utter certainty in her voice that makes goosebumps ripple up and down Mal's arms, and that's quite enough of _that_ for one morning.

"Right then, I'll keep that in mind," he says, and makes a shooing motion with his hands like he's trying to usher her back to her own ship. "Well, now, it was a pleasure getting bullied by the Alliance, we'll have to do it again sometime. Maybe you'll let me put some actual clothes on, that'd be nice." Donovan gives him a flat look, which he returns with a cheeky smile and twinkle of his fingers.

Once their ships are disconnected and Mycroft and his gorram _space-station_ are nothing but a spec of gorram _space-dust_ in the far distance, Mal turns and calls out into the empty, dim-lit cargo bay, " _Bao-bei."_

River materializes immediately, her toes bare and blue on the grating under her feet. Catching his look, she sits down, dress falling around her knees and legs dangling from the walkway like a child by a stream-bed. Simon's nearby; Mal can see his shadow moving in one of the doorways further up. He'd have been more alarmed if Simon wasn't hovering at hand.

After a moment of silence, River offers, "Sherlock Holmes has never killed a man."

"But?" Mal goes, hearing it in her voice.

"But Sally Donovan said the same thing to John Watson when they first met," River continues, in a voice like she's reading the scrolling marquee from a nanotech pamphlet, and he knows she's gleaning it right off someone's brain, which is the only time she's particularly lucid. "She said, he'll kill a man someday and then where will you be, but she didn't know John Watson."

Mal keeps quiet.

River looks right at him when she says, "Sherlock Holmes has never killed a man, but John Watson murdered one in cold blood the day they met, so that Sherlock Holmes wouldn't have to."

-

When he gets up there, Sherlock and John are just coming down from the bridge, murmuring lowly, Inara with them, and Mal doesn't even blink; his gun's out of his holster and trained on Sherlock before they'd even reached the bottom stair.

"Mal!" Inara barks, looking affronted in her particular Inara-ish way. Sherlock just looks like Mal did something incredibly boring and a little bit embarrassing, like pick his nose in public. But John, John's pulled a gun out of absolutely nowhere and trained right back on Mal, safety going off with an ominous click, and all of a sudden, Mal completely believes what River said: John is glitter-eyed and focused, utterly steady, and in that instant he looks bigger than Sherlock and bigger than Mal.

He directs his voice at Sherlock, noticing out of the corner of his eye that Zoe and Wash have materialized at the top of the stairs, watchful. "What is it your brother wants you to do? Who's so gorram important to the Alliance that he has you scouring this backwater part of space lookin' for 'em?"

Sherlock grins, sly and amused. "The Tams," he says, and when the muzzle of Mal's gun dips in surprise, he ducks past, going without any particular concern, "now if you'll excuse me, thank you."

Mal's gaze flits to John, who's tucking the gun into the back of his trousers, smiling tiredly like that hadn't just happened. "I don't think Sherlock is going to forgive Mycroft any time soon for letting the government use him as a lab rat," he says, shifting his weight back to his right leg. "Sherlock holds grudges, and I do mean in a through-the-generations, wrath of God kind of way. As long as Mycroft is relying on Sherlock to find them, Simon and River are safe from ever being found."

Inara steps forward, putting herself between John and Mal, though John's smiling like there's no threat at all. "Mal, put your gun down," she says, in that _I am trained to disarm you only using the power of my voice_ way she learned at the Companion House, and he does.

-

Still, it's with no small amount of relief that they touch down at one of their regular ports in Greenleaf and Sherlock announces that it's a sufficiently interesting enough place to disembark for, since he's more than pretty sure that the governor of the state has impregnated his niece and it's just the kind of bomb that's going to end his career if it ever gets out.

"So I take it we've got some locals to rile up," John goes dryly, earning him a full-lit smile, all teeth. It's unfairly dazzling at close range.

"Right you are, John! He's a bloody awful governor anyway, isn't even intelligent enough to notice his wife's been putting itching powder in his foot cream for five years now. He shouldn't be allowed in a position of power, even on the outer rim, if he's really that dense. No offense," he adds belatedly for the benefit of Serenity's crew.

"None taken," goes Wash, who's always quickest on these things. "Funnily enough, he doesn't take too well to smugglers on his turf either and likes to run us out of town with a lot of fancy gun-waving, so we wouldn't be all that fussed if he found himself incapacitated from office in the near future."

"Excellent," Sherlock claps his hands together, making both Wash and Kaylee smile wide and a little goofy, and for goodness sake, _really?_ That's half his crew that's been charmed by a madman with a brother so high up in the government his position doesn't even officially exist. It's like they've got no common sense or self-preservation (although this is probably why Mal hired them all, who is he kidding.)

So, it's no small amount of relief, but it's also no particular surprise when they dock and find a hoard of Cantonese gang members waiting for them with their guns drawn.

"It's like nobody trusts each other anymore," Mal comments, mournful, before gunfire erupts.

He gets clipped in the shoulder and Jayne almost gets gutted like a fish in a close-range tussle, but Mal hadn't counted on John, who walks out right into the middle of it and takes five of them down in as many shots before Mal even lands one hit. Somewhere above the roar of Serenity's engines and the staccato exchange of bullets, Mal can hear River calling things down, and hell, hell, hell, ain't she supposed to be tucked away until someone can determine whether or not this port's got her and her brother's face plastered everywhere? Sherlock's yelling something back, and then he's shouting out to John right before one of the thugs gets close enough to get his hands on him. John spins, Sherlock's name loud in his mouth and his posture wide open for attack, but it's Zoe who twists, puts a bullet in the thug's back before he gets a knife in Sherlock's stomach.

" _John,"_ cries River from somewhere, nothing in her voice but urgency, and Mal gets what she wants him to do the same second John does: he's closer, but Mal's got the better shot, only Mal's got one of the remaining thugs bearing down on him and it's a split-second decision: he swings away from the thug, aims, and fires.

The ringleader, who's wearing a vest and has been hanging back since the shooting started, grunts in surprise, hands flying to her waist: there are gold coins spilling from the hole Mal made in the pouch on her belt, dozens of glittering golden things spinning into the dust, and Mal doesn't see what happens next because pain explodes in his shoulder. He hits the grating hard, watches Book wrestle the gun from the thug just as his vision goes fuzzy.

-

"There'd been a bit more gold in her pouch than her hired hands had been expecting her to have," Simon informs him when he's stitching up the wound later, and around his body, Mal can see John doing the same for Jayne, and enduring much louder verbal abuse for it. "They turned on her, and it was easy pickings from then on. The end, thanks for listening."

"I do so love these nice get-togethers we always have, Doc, don't you?" Mal grumbles, trying to make up for passing out like a pussy.

It's a near half-day later before they try the farewell thing again, John in the unassuming desert robes again with duffel in hand and Sherlock all but bouncing around him. Sherlock shakes Zoe's hand first with something like genuine respect, then Mal's like it's an afterthought, just something he should do. Mal rolls his eyes, but Sherlock's already moved on, radiating discomfort as he stoops down to kiss both Kaylee and River on the cheek, making them giggle like little girls in pigtails, high, happy sounds that Mal likes hearing, but don't let it get out, understand.

John offers him his hand too, and it's only then that Mal notices.

"Your leg," he goes dumbly, and John grins, shifts his weight easily from side to side.

"It's not entirely fake," he confesses in a way that's almost sheepish, like he's trying to apologize for making them think he was lame. "Just an aftereffect of the war. We thought it was a clever con: man with a phantom limp, give him a cane and let him talk to people, get them comfortable with his disability and then when the inevitable fight breaks out, take them by surprise when the phantom limp stops being so phantom."

"Hmmm," Mal replies, considering. It's always the ones that you overlook that are the most dangerous.

This time, when Sherlock Holmes and John Watson walk off, they're shoulder to shoulder, matched up easy in stride and fading into the daylight.

-

"You kept his cane, didn't you?" Inara goes when they're packing up ship later, disapproval practically visible the way it's coming off her.

Mal held up his hands, all, _who me?_ "Hey, I fought in a war, too! It's not a bad idea!"

Inara shakes her head, smelling of jasmine and girly things, and as usual, Mal can't bring himself to be too put out. "I don't believe you," she grumbles, and stomps off without actually stomping.

Humming, Mal heads up to the bridge to plot them a course for somewhere new.

 

 

-  
fin


End file.
